M. Aizenberg's Poetry of the 1970-1980s in the Context of Unofficial Literature of the Late Soviet Period

This thesis is devoted to the analysis of M. Aizenberg's Samizdat poems of the 1970s and 1980s in the context of the period of late stagnation and perestroika. Our research is aimed to identify the features of Aizenberg's poetics: the position of the subject in the text, the "quality" of his voice, prevailing emotions. By reinforcing our considerations with Aizenberg's autobiographical notes, we manage to discover the author's position in relation to the epoch, but the statement itself turns out to be "elusive". The work examines and problematizes poems, written from the first person, as well as poems, which address to someone – that turn out to be addressed to himself, but "Other". We note the syntactic features of early poetics, the main motives. Due to the consideration of the poetics of the late stagnation, in the poems of the early 1980s and the period of perestroika, a detachment from the familiar motives of searching for subjectivity and "winning back" their right to exist is revealed; as well as a contrast with the language of the "past". The work also includes an analysis of Aizenberg's poems about the war in Afghanistan and about Butyrskaya prison – as signs of time and a personal trauma that can be deciphered. In addition, because of the analysis of poems about "friends", we discover the author's strategy in relation to the epoch within the community of "svokh" – the position of "vnenahodimost".